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A HALF CENTURY AMONG THE SIAMESE AND THE LĀO
[Illustration:
Daniel McGilvary]
A HALF CENTURY AMONG THE SIAMESE AND THE LĀO
An Autobiography
By
DANIEL McGILVARY, D.D.
With an Appreciation by Arthur J. Brown, D.D.
Illustrated
[Illustration]
New York Chicago Toronto
Fleming H. Revell Company
London and Edinburgh
Copyright, 1912, by
Fleming H. Revell Company
New York: 158 Fifth Avenue
Chicago: 125 N. Wabash Ave.
Toronto: 25 Richmond St., W.
London: 21 Paternoster Square
Edinburgh: 100 Princes Street
------------------------------------------------------------------------
TO
MY WIFE
------------------------------------------------------------------------
AN APPRECIATION
Missionary biography is one of the most interesting and instructive of
studies. It is, however, a department of missionary literature to which
Americans have not made proportionate contribution. The foreign
missionary Societies of the United States now represent more
missionaries and a larger expenditure than the European Societies, but
most of the great missionary biographies are of British and Continental
missionaries, so that many Americans do not realize that there are men
connected with their own Societies whose lives have been characterized
by eminent devotion and large achievement.
Because I regarded Dr. McGilvary as one of the great missionaries of the
Church Universal, I urged him several years ago to write his
autobiography. He was then over seventy-five years of age, and I told
him that he could not spend his remaining strength to any better
advantage to the cause he loved than in preparing such a volume. His
life was not only one of unusual length (he lived to the ripe age of
eighty-three), but his missionary service of fifty-three years covered
an interesting part of the history of missionary work in Siam, and the
entire history, thus far, of the mission to the Lāo people of northern
Siam. There is no more fascinating story in fiction or in that truth
which is stranger than fiction, than the story of his discovery of a
village of strange speech near his station at Pechaburī, Siam, his
learning the language of the villagers, his long journey with his
friend, Dr. Jonathan Wilson, into what was then the unknown region of
northern Siam, pushing his little boat up the great river and pausing
not until he had gone six hundred miles northward and arrived at the
city of Chiengmai. The years that followed were years of toil and
privation, of loneliness and sometimes of danger; but the missionaries
persevered with splendid faith and courage until the foundations of a
prosperous Mission were laid.
In all the marked development of the Lāo Mission, Dr. McGilvary was a
leader—the leader. He laid the foundations of medical work, introducing
quinine and vaccination among a people scourged by malaria and smallpox,
a work which has now developed into five hospitals and a leper asylum.
He began educational work, which is now represented by eight boarding
schools and twenty-two elementary schools, and is fast expanding into a
college, a medical college, and a theological seminary. He was the
evangelist who won the first converts, founded the first church, and had
a prominent part in founding twenty other churches, and in developing a
Lāo Christian Church of four thousand two hundred and five adult
communicants. His colleague, the Rev. Dr. W. C. Dodd, says that Dr.
McGilvary selected the sites for all the present stations of the Mission
long before committees formally sanctioned the wisdom of his choice. He
led the way into regions beyond and was the pioneer explorer into the
French Lāo States, eastern Burma, and even up to the borders of China.
Go where you will in northern Siam, or in many sections of the
extra-Siamese Lāo States, you will find men and women to whom Dr.
McGilvary first brought the Good News. He well deserves the name so
frequently given him even in his lifetime—“The Apostle to the Lāo.”
It was my privilege to conduct our Board’s correspondence with Dr.
McGilvary for more than a decade, and, in 1902, to visit him in his home
and to journey with him through an extensive region. I have abiding and
tender memories of those memorable days. He was a Christian gentleman of
the highest type, a man of cultivation and refinement, of ability and
scholarship, of broad vision and constructive leadership. His
evangelistic zeal knew no bounds. A toilsome journey on elephants
through the jungles brought me to a Saturday night with the weary
ejaculation: “Now we can have a day of rest!” The next morning I slept
late; but Dr. McGilvary did not; he spent an hour before breakfast in a
neighbouring village, distributing tracts and inviting the people to
come to a service at our camp at ten o’clock. It was an impressive
service,—under a spreading bo tree, with the mighty forest about us,
monkeys curiously peering through the tangled vines, the huge elephants
browsing the bamboo tips behind us, and the wondering people sitting on
the ground, while one of the missionaries told the deathless story of
redeeming love. But Dr. McGilvary was not present. Seventy-four years
old though he was, he had walked three miles under a scorching sun to
another village and was preaching there, while Dr. Dodd conducted the
service at our camp. And I said: “If that is the way Dr. McGilvary
rests, what does he do when he works?” Dr. McKean, his associate of many
years, writes:
“No one who has done country evangelistic work with Dr. McGilvary can
ever forget the oft-seen picture of the gray-haired patriarch seated on
the bamboo floor of a thatch-covered Lāo house, teaching some one to
read. Of course, the book faced the pupil, and it was often said that he
had taught so many people in this way that he could read the Lāo
character very readily with the book upside down. Little children
instinctively loved him, and it is therefore needless to say that he
loved them. In spite of his long snow-white beard, never seen in men of
this land and a strange sight to any Lāo child, the children readily
came to him. Parents have been led to God because Dr. McGilvary loved
their children and laid his hands upon them. In no other capacity was
the spirit of the man more manifest than in that of a shepherd. Always
on the alert for every opportunity, counting neither time nor distance
nor the hardship of inclement weather, swollen streams, pathless jungle,
or impassable road, he followed the example of his Master in seeking to
save the lost. His very last journey, which probably was the immediate
cause of his last illness, was a long, wearisome ride on horseback,
through muddy fields and deep irrigating ditches, to visit a man whom he
had befriended many years ago and who seemed to be an inquirer.”
Dr. McGilvary was pre-eminently a man who walked with God. His piety was
not a mere profession, but a pervasive and abiding force. He knew no
greater joy than to declare the Gospel of his blessed Lord to the people
to whose up-lifting he had devoted his life. “If to be great is ‘to take
the common things of life and walk truly among them,’ he was a great
man—great in soul, great in simplicity, great in faith and great in
love. Siam is the richer because Daniel McGilvary gave her fifty-three
years of unselfish service.” Mrs. Curtis, the gifted author of _The Laos
of North Siam_, says of Dr. McGilvary: “Neither Carey nor Judson
surpassed him in strength of faith and zeal of purpose; neither Paton
nor Chalmers has outranked him in the wonders of their achievements, and
not one of the other hundreds of missionaries ever has had more evidence
of God’s blessing upon their work.”
Not only the missionaries but the Lāo people loved him as a friend and
venerated him as a father. Some of his intimate friends were the abbots
and monks of the Buddhist monasteries and the high officials of the
country. No one could know him without recognizing the nobility of soul
of this saintly patriarch, in whom was no guile. December 6th, 1910,
many Americans and Europeans celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of his
marriage. The King of Siam through Prince Damrong, Minister of the
Interior, sent a congratulatory message. Letters, telegrams, and gifts
poured in from many different places. The Christian people of the city
presented a large silver tray, on which was engraved: “The Christian
people of Chiengmai to Dr. and Mrs. McGilvary, in memory of your having
brought the Gospel of Jesus Christ to us forty-three years ago.” The
tray showed in relief the old rest-house where Dr. and Mrs. McGilvary
spent their first two years in Chiengmai, the residence which was later
their home of many years, the old dilapidated bridge, and the handsome
new bridge which spans the river opposite the Christian Girls’
School—thus symbolizing the old and the new eras.
The recent tours of exploration by the Rev. W. Clifton Dodd, D.D., and
the Rev. John H. Freeman have disclosed the fact that the Lāo peoples
are far more numerous and more widely distributed than we had formerly
supposed. Their numbers are now estimated at from twelve to sixteen
millions, and their habitat includes not only the Lāo States of northern
Siam but extensive regions north and northeastward in the Shan States,
Southern China, and French Indo-China. The evangelization of these
peoples is, therefore, an even larger and more important undertaking
than it was understood to be only a few years ago. All the more honour,
therefore, must be assigned to Dr. McGilvary, who laid foundations upon
which a great superstructure must now be built.
Dr. McGilvary died as he would have wished to die and as any Christian
worker might wish to die. There was no long illness. He continued his
great evangelistic and literary labours almost to the end. Only a short
time before his death, he made another of his famous itinerating
journeys, preaching the Gospel to the outlying villages, guiding
perplexed people and comforting the sick and dying. He recked as little
of personal hardship as he had all his life, thinking nothing of hard
travelling, simple fare, and exposure to sun, mud, and rain. Not long
after his return and after a few brief days of illness, he quietly “fell
on sleep,” his death the simple but majestic and dignified ending of a
great earthly career.
The Lāo country had never seen such a funeral as that which marked the
close of this memorable life. Princes, Governors, and High Commissioners
of State sorrowed with multitudes of common people. The business of
Chiengmai was suspended, offices were closed, and flags hung at
half-mast as the silent form of the great missionary was borne to its
last resting-place in the land to which he was the first bringer of
enlightenment, and whose history can never be truly written without
large recognition of his achievements.
Fortunately, Dr. McGilvary had completed this autobiography before his
natural powers had abated, and had sent the manuscript to his
brother-in-law, Professor Cornelius B. Bradley of the University of
California. Dr. Bradley, himself a son of a great missionary to Siam,
has done his editorial work with sympathetic insight. It has been a
labour of love to him to put these pages through the press, and every
friend of the Lāo people and of Dr. McGilvary is his debtor. The book
itself is characterized by breadth of sympathy, richness of experience,
clearness of statement, and high literary charm. No one can read these
pages without realizing anew that Dr. McGilvary was a man of fine mind,
close observation, and descriptive gifts. The book is full of human
interest. It is the story of a man who tells about the things that he
heard and saw and who tells his story well. I count it a privilege to
have this opportunity of commending this volume as one of the books
which no student of southern Asia and of the missionary enterprise can
afford to overlook.
ARTHUR J. BROWN.
156 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PREFACE
Years ago, in the absence of any adequate work upon the subject, the
officers of our Missionary Board and other friends urged me to write a
book on the Lāo Mission. Then there appeared Mrs. L. W. Curtis’
interesting volume, _The Laos of North Siam_, much to be commended for
its accuracy and its valuable information, especially in view of the
author’s short stay in the field. But no such work exhausts its subject.
I have always loved to trace the providential circumstances which led to
the founding of the Lāo Mission and directed its early history. And it
seems important that before it be too late, that early history should be
put into permanent form. I have, therefore, endeavoured to give, with
some fulness of detail, the story of the origin and inception of the
Mission, and of its early struggles which culminated in the Edict of
Religious Toleration. And in the later portions of the narrative I have
naturally given prominence to those things which seemed to continue the
characteristic features and the personal interest of that earlier period
of outreach and adventure, and especially my long tours into the
“regions beyond.”
The appearance during the past year of Rev. J. H. Freeman’s _An Oriental
Land of the Free_, giving very full and accurate information regarding
the present status of the Mission, has relieved me of the necessity of
going over the same ground again. I have, therefore, been content to
draw my narrative to a close with the account of my last long tour in
1898.
The work was undertaken with many misgivings, since my early training
and the nature of my life-work have not been the best preparation for
authorship. I cherished the secret hope that one of my own children
would give the book its final revision for the press. But at last an
appeal was made to my brother-in-law, Professor Cornelius B. Bradley of
the University of California, whose birth and years of service in Siam,
whose broad scholarship, fine literary taste, and hearty sympathy with
our missionary efforts indicated him as the man above all others best
qualified for this task. His generous acceptance of this work, and the
infinite pains he has taken in the revision and editing of this book,
place me under lasting obligations to him.
I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to Dr. W. A. Briggs and to Rev. J.
H. Freeman for the use of maps prepared by them, and to Dr. Briggs and
others for the use of photographs.
DANIEL MCGILVARY.
April 6, 1911,
CHIENGMAI.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
NOTE BY THE EDITOR
The task which has fallen to me in connection with this book, was
undertaken as a labour of love; and such it seems to me even more, now
that it ends in sadness of farewell. It has not been an easy task. The
vast spaces to be traversed, and the months of time required before a
question could receive its answer, made consultation with the author
almost impossible. And the ever-present fear that for him the night
might come before the work could receive a last revision at his hands,
or even while he was still in the midst of his story, led me continually
to urge upon him the need of persevering in his writing—which was
evidently becoming an irksome task—and on my part to hasten on a
piecemeal revision as the chapters came to hand, though as yet I had no
measure of the whole to guide me.
It is, therefore, a great comfort to know that my urgency and haste were
not in vain; that all of the revision reached him in time to receive his
criticism and correction—though his letter on the concluding chapter
was, as I understand, the very last piece of writing that he ever did.
How serene and bright it was, and with no trace of the shadow so soon to
fall!
But the draft so made had far outgrown the possible limits of
publication, and was, of course, without due measure and proportion of
parts. In the delicate task of its reduction I am much indebted to the
kind suggestions of the Rev. Arthur J. Brown, D.D., and the Rev. A. W.
Halsey, D.D., Secretaries of the Board of Foreign Missions of the
Presbyterian Church, and of the Rev. W. C. Dodd, D.D., of the Lāo
Mission, who, fortunately, was in this country, and who read the
manuscript. For what appears in this book, however, I alone must assume
the responsibility. “An autobiography is a personal book, expressive of
personal opinion.” And whether we agree with them or not, the opinions
of a man like Dr. McGilvary, formed during a long lifetime of closest
contact with the matters whereof he speaks, are an essential part not
only of the history of those matters, but of the portrait of the man,
and far more interesting than any mere details of events or scenes. On
all grave questions, therefore, on which he has expressed his deliberate
opinion, I have preferred to err on the side of inclusion rather than
exclusion.
* * * * *
The plan adopted in this volume for spelling Siamese and Lāo words is
intended to make possible, and even easy, a real approximation to the
native pronunciation. Only the tonal inflections of native speech and
the varieties of aspiration are ignored, as wholly foreign to our usage
and, therefore, unmanageable.
The consonant-letters used and the digraphs _ch_ and _ng_ have their
common English values.
The vowels are as follows:
Long ā as in _father_
ē as in _they_
ī as in _pique_
ō as in _rode_
ū as in _rude_, _rood_
aw as in _lawn_
ê as in _there_ (without the _r_)
ô as in _world_ (without the _r_)
û is the _high-mixed_ vowel, not found in English.
It may be pronounced as u.
Short a as in _about_ (German _Mann_)—_not_ as in _hat_.
e as in _set_
i as in _sit_
o as in _obey_ (N. Eng. _coat_)—_not_ as in _cot_.
u as in _pull_, _foot_—_not_ as in _but_.
The last four long vowels have also their corresponding shorts, but
since these rarely occur, it has not been thought worth while to burden
the scheme with extra characters to represent them.
The diphthongs are combinations of one of these vowels, heavily
stressed, and nearly always long in quantity—which makes it seem to us
exaggerated or drawled—with a “vanish” of short _i_, _o_, (for _u_), or
_a_. _ai_ (= English long i, y) and _ao_ (= English _ow_) are the only
diphthongs with short initial element, and are to be distinguished from
_āi_ and _āo_. In deference to long established usage in maps and the
like, _ie_ is used in this volume where _ia_ would be the consistent
spelling, and _oi_ for _awi_.
* * * * *
A word remains to be said concerning the name of the people among whom
Dr. McGilvary spent his life. That name has suffered uncommonly hard
usage, especially at the hands of Americans, as the following brief
history will show. Its original form in European writing was _Lāo_, a
fairly accurate transcription by early French travellers of the name by
which the Siamese call their cousins to the north and east. The word is
a monosyllable ending in a diphthong similar to that heard in the proper
names _Macāo_, _Mindanāo_, _Callāo_. In French writing the name often
appeared in the plural form, _les Laos_; the added _s_, however, being
silent, made no difference with the pronunciation. This written plural,
then, it would seem, English-speaking people took over without
recognizing the fact that it was only plural, and made it their standard
form for all uses, singular as well as plural. With characteristic
ignorance or disregard of its proper pronunciation, on the mere basis of
its spelling, they have imposed on it a barbarous pronunciation of their
own—_Lay-oss_. It is to be regretted that the usage of American
missionaries has been most effective in giving currency and countenance
to this blunder—has even added to it the further blunder of using it as
the name of the region or territory, as well as of the people. But the
word is purely ethnical—a proper adjective like our words _French_ or
_English_, and, like these, capable of substantive use in naming either
the people or their language, but not their land. Needless to say, these
errors have no currency whatever among European peoples excepting the
English, and they have very little currency in England. It seems high
time for us of America to amend not only our false pronunciation, but
our false usage, and the false spelling upon which these rest. In
accordance with the scheme of spelling adopted in this work, the _a_ of
the name Lāo is marked with the macron to indicate its long quantity and
stress.
CORNELIUS BEACH BRADLEY.
BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA,
December, 1911.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS
I. CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 19
II. MINISTERIAL TRAINING 35
III. BANGKOK 43
IV. PECHABURĪ—THE CALL OF THE 53
NORTH
V. THE CHARTER OF THE LĀO MISSION 66
VI. CHIENGMAI 77
VII. PIONEER WORK 84
VIII. FIRST-FRUITS 95
IX. MARTYRDOM 102
X. THE ROYAL COMMISSION 118
XI. DEATH OF KĀWILŌROT 130
XII. THE NEW RÉGIME 140
XIII. EXPLORATION 150
XIV. FIRST FURLOUGH 160
XV. MÛANG KÊN AND CHIENG DĀO 169
XVI. SEEKERS AFTER GOD 180
XVII. THE RESIDENT COMMISSIONER 191
XVIII. WITCHCRAFT 199
XIX. THE EDICT OF RELIGIOUS 207
TOLERATION
XX. SCHOOLS—THE NINE YEARS’ 221
WANDERER
XXI. SECOND FURLOUGH 236
XXII. A SURVEYING EXPEDITION 244
XXIII. EVANGELISTIC TRAINING 255
XXIV. STRUGGLE WITH THE POWERS OF 266
DARKNESS
XXV. CHRISTIAN COMMUNITIES PLANTED 276
XXVI. A FOOTHOLD IN LAMPŪN 289
XXVII. A PRISONER OF JESUS CHRIST 300
XXVIII. CIRCUIT TOUR WITH MY DAUGHTER 308
XXIX. LENGTHENING THE CORDS AND 320
STRENGTHENING THE STAKES
XXX. AMONG THE MŪSÔ VILLAGES—FAMINE 338
XXXI. CHIENG RUNG AND THE SIPSAWNG 353
PANNĀ
XXXII. THIRD FURLOUGH—STATION AT 370
CHIENG RĀI
XXXIII. THE REGIONS BEYOND 386
XXXIV. THE CLOSED DOOR 402
XXXV. CONCLUSION 413
INDEX 431
------------------------------------------------------------------------
ILLUSTRATIONS
DANIEL MCGILVARY _Frontispiece_
WILLIAM J. BINGHAM 30
MAHĀ MONKUT, KING OF SIAM, 1851-1872 48
PAGODA OF WAT CHÊNG, BANGKOK 56
REV. DAN BEACH BRADLEY, M.D., 1872 70
KĀWILŌROT, PRINCE OF CHIENGMAI (ABOUT 70
1869)
A REST BETWEEN RAPIDS IN THE GORGE OF 76
THE MÊ PING RIVER
POLING UP THE MÊ PING RIVER 76
TEMPLE OF THE OLD TĀI STYLE OF 82
ARCHITECTURE, CHIENGMAI
A CREMATION PROCESSION 146
INTERIOR OF A TEMPLE, PRÊ 158
AN ABBOT PREACHING 188
INTANON, PRINCE OF CHIENGMAI 202
ELDER NĀN SUWAN 202
DR. MCGILVARY, 1881 238
MRS. MCGILVARY, 1881 238
CHULALONGKORN, KING OF SIAM, 1872-1910 242
PRESBYTERY, RETURNING FROM MEETING IN 264
LAKAWN
MARKET SCENE IN CHIENGMAI 274
IN THE HARVEST-FIELD 274
GIRLS’ SCHOOL IN CHIENGMAI, 1892 284
REV. JONATHAN WILSON, D.D., 1898 294
FIRST CHURCH IN CHIENGMAI 318
DR. MCGILVARY’S HOME IN CHIENGMAI 318
MRS. MCGILVARY, 1893 332
MŪSÔ PEOPLE AND HUT NEAR CHIENG RAI 348
GROUP OF YUNNAN LĀO 356
PHYA SURA SIH, SIAMESE HIGH COMMISSIONER 384
FOR THE NORTH
HIS MAJESTY, MAHĀ VAJIRAVUDH, KING OF 424
SIAM
DR. AND MRS. MCGILVARY, FIFTY YEARS 428
AFTER THEIR MARRIAGE
MAP OF NORTHERN SIAM SHOWING MISSION 326
STATIONS
MAP OF SIAM 430
------------------------------------------------------------------------
I
CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH
Heredity and early environment exercise such a determining influence in
forming a man’s character and shaping his destiny that, without some
knowledge of these as a clew, his after-life would often be
unintelligible. And beyond these there is doubtless a current of events,
directing the course of every man’s life, which no one else can see so
clearly as the man himself. In the following review of my early life, I
have confined myself, therefore, to those events which seem to have led
me to my life-work, or to have prepared me for it.
By race I am a Scotsman of Scotsmen. My father, Malcom McGilvary, was a
Highland lad, born in the Isle of Skye, and inheriting the marked
characteristics of his race. In 1789, when Malcom was eleven years old,
my grandfather brought his family to the United States, and established
himself in Moore County, North Carolina, on the headwaters of the Cape
Fear River. The McGilvarys had but followed in the wake of an earlier
immigration of Scottish Highlanders, whose descendants to this day form
a large proportion of the population of Moore, Cumberland, Richmond,
Robeson, and other counties of North Carolina. My father’s brothers
gradually scattered, one going to the southwestern, and two to the
northwestern frontier. My father, being the youngest of the family,
remained with his parents on the homestead. The country was then
sparsely settled; communication was slow and uncertain. The scattered
members of the family gradually lost sight of one another and of the
home. My mother belonged to the McIver clan—from the same region of the
Scottish Highlands, and as numerous in North Carolina as the McGilvarys
were scarce. She was born in this country not long after the arrival of
her parents.
I was born May 16th, 1828, being the youngest of seven children. As soon
after my birth as my mother could endure the removal, she was taken to
Fayetteville, thirty-five miles distant, to undergo a dangerous surgical
operation. The journey was a trying one. Anæsthetics were as yet
unknown. My poor mother did not long survive the shock. She died on the
23d of November of that year.
Since feeding-bottles were not then in use, the motherless infant was
passed around to the care of aunts and cousins, who had children of like
age. Two aunts in particular, Catharine McIver and Margaret McNeill, and
a cousin, Effie McIver, always claimed a share in me for their motherly
ministrations till, at last, I could be turned over to my sister Mary.
She, though but six years my senior, was old beyond her years; and the
motherly care with which she watched over her little charge was long
remembered and spoken of in the family.
When I was four years old, my father married his second wife, Miss Nancy
McIntosh. The next nine years, till my father’s death, June 8th, 1841,
were spent in the uneventful routine of a godly family in a country
home. My father’s rigid ideas of family discipline were inherited from
his Presbyterian ancestors in Scotland, and his own piety was of a
distinctly old-school type. He was a ruling elder in the church at
Buffalo, Fayetteville Presbytery, in which office he was succeeded by my
brother, Evander, and three others of his sons became elders in other
churches. No pressure of business was ever allowed to interfere with
family worship night and morning. A psalm or hymn from the old village
hymnbook always formed part of the service. My father was an early
riser, and, in the winter time, family worship was often over before the
dawn. Almost every spare moment of his time he spent in reading Scott’s
Family Bible, the Philadelphia _Presbyterian_, or one of the few books
of devotion which composed the family library. The special treasure of
the book-case was the great quarto Illustrated Family Bible, with the
Apocrypha and Brown’s Concordance, published by M. Carey, Philadelphia,
1815. It was the only pictorial book in the library, and its pictures
were awe-inspiring to us children—especially those in the Book of
Revelation:—The Dragon Chained, The Beast with Seven Heads and Ten
Horns, and the Vision of the Four Seals. These and the solemn themes of
Russell’s _Seven Sermons_—which on rainy days I used to steal away by
myself to read—made a profound impression on me.
Scottish folk always carry the school with the kirk. Free schools were
unknown; but after the crops were “laid by,” we always had a
subscription school, in which my father, with his large family, had a
leading interest. The teacher “boarded around” with the pupils. Our
regular night-task was three questions and answers in the Shorter
Catechism—no small task for boys of ten or twelve years. My memory of
the Catechism once stood me in good stead in after-life. When examined
for licensure by the Orange Presbytery, I was asked, “What is man’s
state by nature?” In reply I gave the answers to the nineteenth and
twentieth questions in the Catechism. A perceptible smile passed over
the faces of many of the presbyters, and Father Lynch said, “He is right
on the Catechism. He will pass.” In those days to be “right on the
Catechism” would atone for many failures in Hodge or Turretin.
The church was at the village of Buffalo, four miles from our home, but
no one of the family was expected to be absent from the family pew on
“the Sabbath.” Carriages were a later luxury in that region. Our two
horses carried father and mother, with the youngest of the little folks
mounted behind, till he should be able to walk with the rest.
The great event of the year was the camp-meeting at the Fall Communion.
It served as an epoch from which the events of the year before and after
it were dated. For weeks before it came, all work on the farm was
arranged with reference to “Buffalo Sacrament”—pronounced with long a in
the first syllable. It was accounted nothing for people to come fifteen,
twenty, or even forty miles to the meetings. Every pew-holder had a
tent, and kept open house. No stranger went away hungry. Neighbouring
ministers were invited to assist the pastor. Services began on Friday,
and closed on Monday, unless some special interest suggested the wisdom
of protracting them further. The regular order was: A sunrise
prayer-meeting, breakfast, a prayer-meeting at nine, a sermon at ten, an
intermission, and then another sermon. The sermons were not accounted of
much worth if they were not an hour long. The pulpit was the tall
old-fashioned boxpulpit with a sounding-board above. For want of room in
the church, the two sermons on Sunday were preached from a stand in the
open air. At the close of the second sermon the ruling elders, stationed
in various parts of the congregation, distributed to the communicants
the “tokens,”[1] which admitted them to the sacramental table. Then, in
solemn procession, the company marched up the rising ground to the
church, singing as they went:
“Children of the Heavenly King,
As ye journey sweetly sing.”
Footnote 1:
The “token” was a thin square piece of lead stamped with the initial
letter of the name of the church.
It was a beautiful sight, and we boys used to climb the hill in advance
to see it. When the audience was seated, there was a brief introductory
exercise. Then a hymn was sung, while a group of communicants filled the
places about the communion table. There was an address by one of the
ministers, during the progress of which the bread and the wine were
passed to the group at the table. Then there was singing again, while
the first group retired, and a second group took its place. The same
ceremony was repeated for them, and again for others, until all
communicants present had participated. The communion service must have
occupied nearly two hours. One thing I remember well—when the children’s
dinner-time came (which was after all the rest had dined), the sun was
low in the heavens, and there was still a night service before us.
Notwithstanding some inward rebellion, it seemed all right then. But the
same thing nowadays would drive all the young people out of the church.
With some diffidence I venture to make one criticism on our home life.
The “Sabbath” was too rigidly observed to commend itself to the judgment
and conscience of children—too rigidly, perhaps, for the most healthy
piety in adults. It is hard to convince boys that to whistle on Sunday,
even though the tune be “Old Hundred,” is a sin deserving of censure. An
afternoon stroll in the farm or the orchard might even have clarified my
father’s vision for the enjoyment of his Scott’s Bible at night. It
would surely have been a means of grace to his boys. But such was the
Scottish type of piety of those days, and it was strongly held. The
family discipline was of the reserved and dignified type, rather than of
the affectionate. Implicit obedience was the law for children. My father
loved his children, but never descended to the level of familiarity with
them when young, and could not sympathize with their sports.
But dark days were coming. Brother John Martin presently married and
moved west. In August, 1840, an infant sister died of quinsy—the first
death I ever witnessed. On June 8th, 1841, the father and “house-bond”
of the family was taken away. The inheritance he left his children was
the example of an upright, spotless life—of more worth than a legacy of
silver and gold. These we might have squandered, but that was
inalienable.
At thirteen, I was small for my age—too small to do a man’s work on the
farm; and there was no money with which to secure for me an education.
Just then occurred one of those casual incidents which often determine
the whole course of one’s life. Mr. Roderick McIntosh, one of my
mother’s cousins, being disabled for hard work on the farm, had learned
the tailor’s trade, and was then living in the village of Pittsboro,
twenty-one miles away. His father was a neighbour of ours, and a man
after my father’s own heart. The two families had thus always been very
intimate. While the question of my destiny was thus in the balance, this
cousin, one day, while on a visit to his father, called at our house. He
had mounted his horse to leave, when, turning to Evander, he asked,
“What is Dan’l going to do?” My brother replied, “There he is; ask him.”
Turning to me, he said, “Well, Dan’l, how would you like to come and
live with me? I will teach you a trade.” I had never thought of such a
thing, nor had it ever been mentioned in the family. But somehow it
struck me favourably. Instinctively I replied, “I believe I should like
it.” A life-question could not have been settled more fortuitously. But
it was the first step on the way to Siam and the Lāo Mission.
On the last day of August, 1841, I bade farewell to the old home, with
all its pleasant associations. Every spot of it was dear, but never so
dear as then. Accompanied by my brother Evander, each of us riding one
of the old family horses, I started out for my new home. The departure
was not utterly forlorn, since Evander was still with me. But the
parting from him, as he started back next day, was probably the hardest
thing I had ever experienced. I had to seek a quiet place and give vent
to a flood of tears. For a time I was inexpressibly sad. I realized, as
never before, that I was cut loose from the old moorings—was alone in
the world. But the sorrows of youth are soon assuaged. No one could have
received a warmer welcome in the new home than I did. There were two
children in the family, and they helped to fill the void made by the
separation.
Pittsboro was not a large village, but its outlook was broader than that
of my home. The world seemed larger. I myself felt larger than I had
done as a country boy. I heard discussion of politics and of the
questions of the day. The county was strongly Whig, but Mr. McIntosh was
an unyielding Democrat, and as fond of argument as a politician.
According to southern custom, stores and shops were favourite resorts
for passing away idle time, and for sharpening the wits of the
villagers. The recent Presidential campaign of 1840 furnished unending
themes for discussion in our little shop.
There was no Presbyterian church in Pittsboro at that time. The
church-going population was divided between the Methodist and the
Episcopalian churches, the former being the larger. With my cousin’s
family I attended the Methodist church. On my first Sunday I joined the
Methodist Sunday School, and that school was the next important link in
my chain of life. Its special feature was a system of prizes. A certain
number of perfect answers secured a blue ticket; ten of these brought a
yellow ticket; and yellow tickets, according to the number of them,
entitled the possessor to various prizes—a hymnbook, a Bible, or the
like. On the first Sunday I was put into a class of boys of my own age,
at work on a little primer of one hundred and six questions, all
answered in monosyllables. By the next Sunday I was able to recite the
whole, together with the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed at the
end. It was no great feat; but the teacher and the school thought it
was. So, on the strength of my very first lesson, I got a yellow ticket,
and was promoted to the next higher class. That stimulated my ambition,
and I devoted my every spare hour to study. The next book was one of
questions and answers on the four Gospels. They were very easy; I was
able to commit to memory several hundred answers during the week. In a
few Sundays I got my first prize; and it was not long before I had
secured all the prizes offered in the school. What was of far more value
than the prizes was the greater love for study and for the Scriptures
which the effort had awakened in me, and a desire for an education. The
shop was often idle; I had plenty of time for study, and made the most
of it.
At one of the subsequent Quarterly Meetings, a Rev. Mr. Brainard, who
had considerable reputation as a revivalist, preached one Sunday night a
vivid and thrilling sermon on Noah’s Ark and the Flood. So marked was
the impression on the audience, that, at the close, according to the
Methodist custom, “mourners” were invited to the altar. Many accepted
the invitation. A young friend sitting beside me was greatly affected.
With streaming eyes he said, “Dan’l, let us go, too,” rising up and
starting as he spoke. After a few moments I followed. By this time the
space about the altar was well filled. There was great excitement and no
little confusion—exhortation, singing, and prayer going on all at once.
A number of persons made profession of religion, and soon my young
friend joined them. He was full of joy, and was surprised to find that I
was not so, too. The meetings were continued night after night, and each
night I went to the altar. As I look back upon it from this distance, it
seems to me that, with much exhortation to repent and believe, there was
not enough of clear and definite instruction regarding the plan of
salvation, or the offices and work of Christ. One night, in a quiet hour
at home, the grounds and method of a sinner’s acceptance of Christ
became clear to me, and He became my Lord.
Soon after, when invitation was given to the new converts to join the
church as probationers, I was urged by some good friends to join with
the rest; and was myself not a little inclined to do so. It was no doubt
the influence of my cousin that enabled me to withstand the excitement
of the revival and the gentle pressure of my Methodist friends, and to
join, instead, my father’s old church at Buffalo. But I owe more than I
shall ever know to that Sunday School, and since then I have always
loved the Methodist Church. Meanwhile the prospects for an education
grew no brighter, though Mr. Brantley, then a young graduate in charge
of the Pittsboro Academy, but afterward a distinguished Baptist minister
of Philadelphia, gave me a place in his school at idle times; and a Dr.
Hall used to lend me books to read.
When the opportunity for acquiring an education finally came, it was as
unexpected as a clap of thunder out of a blue sky. The celebrated
Bingham School, now in Asheville, North Carolina, was then, as now, the
most noted in the South. It was started by Rev. William Bingham in
Pittsboro, North Carolina, in the closing years of the eighteenth
century. It was moved to Hillsboro by his son, the late William J.
Bingham, father of the present Principal. The school was patronized by
the leading families of the South. The number of pupils was strictly
limited. To secure a place, application had to be made a year or more in
advance.
My surprise, therefore, can well be imagined, when one day Baccus King,
a young boy of the town, walked into the shop with a letter addressed to
Master Daniel McGilvary from no less a personage than William J.
Bingham, the great teacher and Principal. At first I thought I was the
victim of some boyish trick. But there was the signature, and the
explanation that followed removed all doubt. Nathan Stedman, an
influential citizen of Pittsboro, was an early acquaintance and friend
of Mr. Bingham. He had visited the school in person to secure a place
for his nephew, young King, and had brought back with him the letter for
me. What Mr. Bingham knew of me I never discovered. No doubt Mr. Stedman
could have told, though up to that time I had never more than spoken
with him. Be that as it may, there was the letter with its most generous
offer that I take a course in Bingham School at the Principal’s expense.
He was to board me and furnish all necessary expenses, which, after
graduation, I was to refund by teaching. If I became a minister of the
Gospel, the tuition was to be free; otherwise I was to refund that also.
To young King’s enquiry what I would do, I replied, “Of course, I shall
go.” My cousin, Mr. McIntosh, was scarcely less delighted than I was at
the unexpected opening.
The invitation to attend Bingham School came in the fall of 1845, when I
was in my eighteenth year. There were then only two weeks till the
school should open. I had little preparation to make. A pine box painted
red was soon got ready to serve as a trunk, for my wardrobe was by no
means elaborate. Mr. Stedman kindly offered me a seat with Baccus and a
friend of his who was returning to the school. On the way Baccus’ friend
entertained us with stories of the rigid discipline, for this was in the
days when the rod was not spared. I had no fears of the rod, but I
trembled lest I should not sustain myself as well as such great kindness
demanded. It might be a very different thing from winning a reputation
in a Methodist Sunday School.
It was dusk when we reached The Oaks. The family was at supper. Mr.
Bingham came out to receive us. He told Baccus’ friend to take him to
his own old quarters, and, turning to me, said, “I have made
arrangements for you to board with Mr. C., and to room with Mr. K., the
assistant teacher, till my house is finished, when you are to live with
us. But we are at supper now. You must be hungry after your long ride.
Come in and eat with us.” After supper, Mr. Bingham went with me to my
boarding-house, and introduced me to my hosts and to my chum, David
Kerr. He welcomed me, and said he thought we should get along finely
together. We not only did that, but he became a warm friend to whom I
owed much. So I was in the great Bingham School, overwhelmed with a
succession of unexpected kindnesses from so many quarters! What did it
all mean?
[Illustration:
WILLIAM J. BINGHAM]
My highest anticipations of the school were realized. If there ever was
a born teacher, William J. Bingham was one. Latin and Greek were taught
then by a method very different from the modern one. Before a sentence
was read or translated, the invariable direction was—master your
grammar. In grammar-drill Mr. Bingham could have no superior. Bullion’s
Grammars and Readers were the text-books. The principal definitions were
learned practically verbatim. The coarse print was required of all in
the class. The older pupils were advised to learn notes, exceptions, and
all. I never became so familiar with any other books as with that series
of grammars. We were expected to decline every noun and adjective, alone
or combined, from nominative singular to ablative plural, backwards or
forwards, and to give, at a nod, voice, mood, tense, number, and person
of any verb in the lesson. These exercises became at last so easy that
they were great fun. Even now, sixty years later, I often put myself to
sleep by repeating the old paradigms.
It may seem that my estimate of Mr. Bingham is prejudiced by my sense of
personal obligation to him for his kindness. Yet I doubt not that the
universal verdict of every one who went there to study would be that he
should be rated as one of the world’s greatest teachers. The South owes
much to him for the dignity he gave to the profession of teaching. No
man ever left a deeper impress on me. Thousands of times I have thanked
the Lord for the opportunity to attend his school.
I was graduated from the school in May, 1849, a few days before I was
twenty-one years old. On leaving my kind friends at The Oaks, I was
again at sea. It will be remembered that, by my original agreement, I
was booked for teaching—but I had no idea where. Once more the
unexpected happened. In the midst of negotiations for a school in the
southern part of the state, I was greatly surprised at receiving an
offer from one of the prominent business men of my own town, Pittsboro,
to assist me in organizing a new school of my own there. With much doubt
and hesitation on my part—for there were already two preparatory schools
in the place—the venture was made, and I began with ten pupils taught in
a little business office. The number was considerably increased during
the year. But when the second year opened, I was put in charge of the
Academy, whose Principal had resigned. Here, in work both pleasant and
fairly profitable, I remained until the four years for which I had
agreed to stay were up.
I had by no means reached my ideal. But, as my friends had predicted, it
had been a success. Some of my warmest supporters were sure that I was
giving up a certainty for an uncertainty, in not making teaching my
life-work. It had evidently been the hope of my friends from the first
that I would make Pittsboro my home, and build up a large and permanent
school there. But my purpose of studying for the ministry had never
wavered, and that made it easier for me to break off.
During these four years my relations with the newly organized
Presbyterian church had been most pleasant and profitable. There was no
resisting the appeal that I should become ruling elder. The
superintendency of the Sunday School also fell naturally to me, and
opened up another field of usefulness. The friendship formed with the
pastor, the Rev. J. H. McNeill, is one of the pleasant memories of my
life.
One feature of the church connection must not be passed over. Neither of
the other elders was so circumstanced as to be able to attend the
meetings of the Orange Presbytery. Three of the leading professors in
the University were members of the Presbytery, and all the leading
schools within its bounds were taught by Presbyterian ministers or
elders. To accommodate this large group of teachers, the meetings were
held in midsummer and midwinter. Thus it fell to my lot to represent the
Pittsboro church at the Presbytery during nearly the whole of the four
years of my stay in Pittsboro. As it was then constituted, its meetings
were almost equal to a course in church government. The Rev. J. Doll,
one of the best of parliamentarians, was stated clerk. A group of
members such as the two Drs. Phillips, father and son, Dr. Elisha
Mitchell, of the University, and many others that could be named, would
have made any assembly noted. Professor Charles Phillips, as chairman of
the committee on candidates for the ministry, came into closer touch
with me than most of the others. He afterwards followed my course in the
Seminary with an interest ripening into a friendship which continued
throughout his life.
The meetings of the Presbytery were not then merely formal business
meetings. They began on Wednesday and closed on Monday. They were looked
forward to by the church in which they were to be held as spiritual and
intellectual feasts. To the members themselves they were seasons of
reunion, where friendships were cemented, and where wits were sharpened
by intellectual conflicts, often before crowded congregations.